While this may come as a surprise to many who witnessed the
Bellator Fighting Championships talent lose consciousness in
each of his last two fights due to violent blows to the head, the
former featherweight champion appears as confident as ever ahead of
his return to 135 pounds on Friday night, when he will square off
with Owen
Evinger in the main event of
Bellator 80 at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in
Hollywood, Fla.

“You’re talking to the baddest man on the planet, baby,” Warren
recently told Sherdog.com. “ I’m coming hard. I’m coming for his
head, and I’m coming to rip it right off.”

In spite of his seemingly ever-present confidence, however, Warren
knows it was not so long ago that he found himself in the
unfamiliar position of lying flat on his back, staring up at the
lights. Warren’s first knockout loss came against Alexis Vila
in September of last year. Then Bellator’s 145-pound champion,
Warren entered the Season 5 bantamweight tournament in an effort to
become the first man in promotional history to hold belts in two
different weight classes. That aspiration was extinguished by Vila
in the tournament quarterfinals, as the stocky Cuban turned out
Warren’s lights with a powerful left hook.

His second defeat took the form of an extended beating on March 9
from Pat
Curran, who rocked Warren with a knee in the third round and
then brutalized the reeling fighter with a flurry against the cage,
wresting away his title and handing him a concussion in return.
Though many criticized referee Jeff Malott
for allowing Warren to absorb so many blows, the man on the
receiving end of that knockout is not among Malott’s
detractors.

“I was just too hard-headed to go to sleep. I was the first person
to tell the ref to make sure that he let this fight go until
someone goes to sleep, because this is a title fight. One of the
worst things that happens is when someone stops a fight too early,”
said Warren. “I know it’s weird to hear that from me. I should say
that he should have stopped it, but I’m fine. Nothing happened to
me. I guess I’d have a different view on this if I would have been
injured. The bottom line is, give us the opportunity to have the
right guy with the belt on. The worst thing to watch is a fight
where the wrong guy won.”

Warren, whose Bellator career has been highlighted by several gutsy
performances, reiterated that he good to go, both physically and
mentally. After undergoing a full medical exam, Warren attempted to
qualify for the 2012 Olympic wrestling team but ultimately came up
short. Still, Warren traveled to London to help coach the squad,
allowing himself the necessary time to recover while avoiding blows
to the head in training.

“I have a wife and two babies. I’m a little bit older and a family
man, and my wife doesn’t let me [gamble with my health], so I was
fully checked out by the Olympic training center doctors and
everybody,” said Warren. “I just had a concussion. You’re talking
about putting two warriors in a cage for five rounds. Things
happen. I believe that could have happened either way, and I
believe that after a lot of big fights -- like a Bellator belt
fight -- one or both guys end up in the hospital.”

The 2006 Greco-Roman wrestling world champion at 132 pounds, Warren
says that his setbacks showed him the importance of playing to his
technical strengths while at the same time prompting him to place
more emphasis on his defense. The Coloradoan also feels that this
permanent move to bantamweight should help to increase his career
longevity.

“I believe [the losses] didn’t take anything away from me, except
they maybe opened my eyes to how I am still vulnerable to a
one-punch knockout. I didn’t believe that could happen,” Warren
said. “I believe I’m a battle-tested veteran, and there aren’t a
lot of us out there. I believe I’ve been through everything [a
fighter can go through] in a cage.”

Now just hours away from stepping back into Bellator’s circle,
Warren says he pays little attention to those who may believe his
best days are behind him.

“Being an entertainer and a top-tier athlete, you deal with a lot
of people who doubt you constantly. If you gave a s--t about what
half of those people thought, then you’d probably have stopped
being a competitive athlete way earlier in your career,” said
Warren. “I’m here for me, and it’s a job. I believe I’m better at
my job now than I was then, and that should show in the ring.

“Now I get an opportunity to get another big win and fight on Spike
TV and maybe [earn a shot] at that [bantamweight] belt for
Bellator, so the future looks good. My main concern is putting a
hole through this Owen
Evinger on Friday and getting back on a winning streak.”

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